mutilation
(mjuːtɪˈleɪʃən)
Also 6 Sc. mutulatioun.
[a. L. mutilātiōn-em, n. of action f. mutilāre to mutilate. Cf. F. mutilation.]
1. The action of depriving (a person or animal) of a limb or of the use of a limb; the excision or maiming (of a limb or bodily organ); also, an instance of the action; rarely a mutilated condition.
| 1646 Sir T. Browne Pseud. Ep. vii. ii. 342 We observe that mutilations are not transmitted from father unto son; the blind begetting such as can see [etc.]. 1651 Hobbes Leviath. ii. xxvii. 160 Mutilation of a limbe, [is a] greater [Crime], than the spoyling a man of his goods. a 1716 South Serm. (1744) X. viii. 239 When a man is in imminent danger of the mutilation of a leg or an arm. 1769 Blackstone Comm. IV. 370 Some punishments..occasion a mutilation or dismembring, by cutting off the hand or ears. 1849 Macaulay Hist. Eng. v. I. 569 Many of them were also sentenced to mutilation. On a single day the hangman of Edinburgh cut off the ears of thirty-five prisoners. 1867 Freeman Norm. Conq. (1877) I. v. 371 There he put on shore the hostages..having first subjected them to various mutilations, as the loss of hands, ears and noses. 1883 Green Conq. Eng. v. 227 The laws against mutilation of cattle. |
b. Scots Law. The action of disabling or wounding (a person) in his members as distinguished from ‘demembration’.
| 1525 Extracts Aberd. Reg. (1844) I. 113 The cruell slauchteris, mutilatiounis, and hurts doyne amang thame under silence of nycht, be thair neychbours about. 1546 Ibid. 230 Tuching the hurting and bluid draving of the said Amrouse Tailzeour, and mutilation of him of his left hand. 1555 Burgh Rec. Stirling (1887) 65 Thai wer acquyt..of mutilatioun of the lard of Cragingelt. 1609 [see demembration]. 1699 Sir A. Seton (title) A Treatise of mutilation and demembration and their punishments. 1797 Encycl. Brit. (ed. 3) IX. 720/2 [Law of Scotland.] Mutilation, or the disabling of a member, is punished at the discretion of the judge. 1838 in Bell's Dict. Law Scotl. |
c. spec. Castration.
| 1727–41 Chambers Cycl. s.v., Mutilation is sometimes also used in a more immediate manner for ‘castration’. 1828–54 in Webster. 1850 in Ogilvie. In some recent Dicts. |
2. The action of rendering (a thing) imperfect by excision or destruction of one or more of its parts; also, an instance of this.
| 1638 Sir T. Herbert Trav. (ed. 2) 117 Making the ships their object (after a great mutilation of shrowds and masts) they sunk the..Fleet. 1659 Pearson Creed ii. 136 All the originall letters in the name Hoseah are preserved in that of Joshua:..this alteration was not made by..diminution or mutilation; but by addition. 1867 Dickens Lett. (1880) II. 270, I have no more power to stop that mutilation of my books than you have. 1874 H. R. Reynolds John Bapt. ii. 69 Very numerous other omissions and mutilations are notified by Tertullian. 1875 Whitney Life Lang. iv. 55 Another consequence of the same difference of accent is the greater mutilation of the radical part of the word in the Romanic languages..than in the Germanic. |